The collection and processing of geographic data often involves a geographic data collector in the field which collects data about a geographic feature. The geographic features may define a point (e.g., a tree, utility pole, fire hydrant, etc), a line (e.g., a road, stream, hedge, pipeline, etc), or a polygon (e.g., a parking lot, playground, housing lot, farm field, etc.). The attributes of a feature are descriptive information which further defines the object. For example, if the feature is a tree, attributes may include the species of tree (e.g., oak, maple, pine, etc.), the height, girth, location, condition (e.g., healthy, dead, overturned, etc.) of the tree.
A structured collection of geographic features and their corresponding attributes is typically stored in a feature library. The feature library is uploaded onto a geographic data collection device and is used to collect geographic data. As an example, if geographic data about a park is to be collected, a feature library may include features such as trees, park benches, parking lots, playground and/or playing fields, light poles, sidewalks and/or paths, roads, and other facilities such as rest rooms, etc. Alternatively, if geographic data is being collected for a utility company, the feature library may include features such as light poles, fire hydrants, water and sewage lines, meters, transformers, etc. Thus, a different feature library can be uploaded depending upon what type of data is to be collected.
In the field, when data is collected about a geographic feature, the location of the feature is recorded along with a code which indicates what type of geographic feature is being recorded. Typically, the surveyor accesses an ASCII file which contains a list of the codes. Typically, ASCII codes are used to minimize the use of computing resources of the geographic data collection device such as memory and/or data storage. This is problematic in that there is no standardized set of codes for geographic features. Therefore, the surveyor needs to know all of the codes within his/her organization. This can be a problem because different working groups may designate different codes for the same geographic feature. As a result, it can be difficult for the surveyor to memorize all of the codes needed to collect the desired data. Alternatively, the surveyor may carry a paper upon which all of the codes are listed, or the geographic data collection application may generate a user interface in which the codes are displayed.
Another problem with the collection and processing of geographic data is that the software applications operating on the geographic data collector and the office application used to process the geographic data are often developed as stand-alone applications. In other words, they are not designed or intended to work together. As a result, the geographic data files generated by a geographic data collection application are typically not formatted to be compatible with the office application used to subsequently process the collected data.
When the geographic data file is accessed by the office application, the office application displays the collected data. As an example, the office application can automatically draw line segments between points of a linear feature, or of a polygon feature. However, there are no additional features associated with the points and lines rendered by the office application. In other words, the attributes associated with a geographic feature are not automatically displayed.
This is especially problematic when a person in the office is not familiar with the site from which the feature/attribute data has been collected. For example, an office technician will see the points and lines displayed by the office application, but may have a hard time interpreting what they mean unless the office technician is familiar with the site. In other words, some prior knowledge of the site is needed in order for the office technician to interpret the collected data. Thus, additional effort is needed for the surveyor in the field to clearly communicate the meaning of the points and lines which are being displayed to the office technician. Alternatively, the office technician can manually look up the ASCII codes which are associated with respective geographic features and manually add that information to the displayed data. As a result, creating a descriptive interpretation of the collected geographic data can be more time consuming, expensive and error prone because the data collection and data rendering applications do not exchange all of the collected data in an efficient manner.